Educational Studies 2022

1. a) By using operant conditioning the teacher can reinforce the work in progress of the
student by giving him good and positive feedbacks if he does well but most
important, the teacher can create a feeling of being rewarded by being able to play
the song and enjoy the music by itself.

b) The student tries to imitate the example of the teacher by reproducing the example,
he is making several attempt to reproduce it correctly and he is learning by making
mistakes and trying to solve them. He is able to identify by himself, but also guided by the
teacher, how I could learn the song.

c) In a classroom, students are learning by being in interaction with others, they are
observing and processing on their own informations about behaviours (good or bad).
While learning the song they will be guided by other students, they will also feel more
comfortable and motivate to be part of a group.

d) The teacher can ask to his student to give himself feedback after performing the
song, by doing that, he is making the student active in the learning process, the
knowledge is then more absorbed by the student who went trough it by himself.

2. a) Sloboda doesn’t believe that musician are born but are made and that the idea of
that a certain amount of people are born with a special gift to become a professional
musician is, from a scientific point of view very less secure that what it’s commonly says.

b) «I will attempt to convince you that the vast majority of the population possesses
the inherited characteristics needed to perform music well, and that differences in
accomplishment are mainly due to differences in experience, opportunity, motivation, and
the differences in learning outcomes that follow from this. » quote from Sloboda’s article.

c) From my experience with young children, I must say that, at a very young age I saw
differences in learning instrument between each children, some are very fast and seems
to have more physical dispositions than others, but I wonder if what I see as « gift » or
« talent » is more related to the effect of the environment while growing up, even at a very
young age, for example sometimes very shy children seems to be less able specially if
they are not comfortable with the teacher, but it has nothing to do with understanding
better or not music, or being able ear well.

d) The idea about gifted kids surely can influence the teaching, and teachers should
be extremely careful about that, because they surely have the power to make a children’s
pretended « talent » to emerge or not. Kids are like sponges, and they are extremely
sensitive to their environment, seeing for example different treatments between one
student to another one can lead them to persuade them that they are not able to play an
instruments, in another way it can also bring them out of their shell and give them
motivation. Our ideas about talent shouldn’t lead us to be less motivated and invested
with a student from the other one, we should as possible try to give the same quality of
teaching to everyone and adapt ourselves to the student.

3. a) The central executive receives and proceeds informations in order to delivered these
informations to the long term memory. Those informations that the central executives
receive are visual and phonological (sounds). For example, the student can associate a
physical and visual movement to a type of sound thanks to this system.

b) Organisation, Association and Repetition

c) Organisation dividing the piece into structured and meaningful part for example being
conscious of repetition if there is.

 Association finding meaningful association in the music, for example emotions,

story telling, anything that speaks to the student.

Repetition learning each small passage by repeating them a few times till they feel
comfortable in memory

4. a) Piaget’s theory of thinking shows that children have different stage of processing
cognitive informations and that they don’t proceed it the same way while growing up.
« The concept of conservation; understanding that, although things may change in
appearance, certain properties remain the same. » For example, if we show them a glass
of water with a certain amount of water, if we place that water in another glass, longer, it
doesn’t change the initial amount of water in the first place.

b) between 7 and 11 yo.

c) The conservation of quantity is important in music in understanding the organisation

of rhythm for example; in one beat you can have a quarter note which would be the
equivalent of 2 eight notes. For understanding the distance between pitches, for example
being conscious that starting from different tones you can have the same distance
between 2 notes (construction of intervals/chords)

5. a) Playing any instruments combines physical and intellectual abilities and stimulates
creativity and the development of a child’s personality. It may seems to be a lonely activity
but it’s the opposite, as a child you will experience very soon playing with others in
orchestra or singing in a choir, learning in a group and enjoying the social atmosphere.

Playing an instrument also requires self discipline, patience and repetition, these are
fundamental skills that you could use for anything in your life. Besides all of that, playing
an instrument is also a way of connecting with yourself, our body and your soul into
music.

b) Some could argue that playing an instrument requires a lot of time, even at a non
professional level to have interesting and encouraging result. It’s also possible to argue
that playing an instrument could be a stressful activity (performing) specially for some
children that feel very anxious.

6. For piano, children from 2 to 5 can start playing the instrument, their motor skills
abilities for this instrument is already enough as the keyboard doesn't require to difficult
movements. At this age, you could expect already cognitive and musical abilities, being
able to recognise music, structured in tones and rhythm.

Concerning the motivation abilities, it’s always tricky to say because parents and teachers
play an important at this age specially; children can be motivated to attempt lesson
because they like their teachers and for practising outside the lesson time as they don’t
have self-regulatory abilities, they will need to be supported by their parents.

But the most important when they start that young is to make the lesson funny, play
around the piano, making their own musical vocabulary and exploring by themselves the
instrument.

7. a) The model of Howard Gardner divide Intelligence into sub category of specific
mental abilities that are necessary to adapt to our environment as Verbal, Logical, Bodily,
Visual, Musical, Naturalist, Intrapersonal and Interpersonal. His model shows that there is
several sensitivity to reach out and solve problems, and that there is no fix standard of
intelligence but multiple and different type of reasoning.

b) It’s almost possible to link all the category of intelligence of H.G’s model, but mainly
Musical, Bodily, Logical, Intrapersonal, Interpersonal and Naturalist.

c) Musical: being able to feel rhythm, hear tones and structured it to understand music

Bodily: being able to use your body to play an instrument as it’s a physical practice

Logical: understanding the structure of music in terms of analysis/harmony and being

able to transcript this knowledge into a mathematical and logical way.

Intrapersonal: being sensitive to others to be able to understand them; being able to feel
a composer’s purpose of his music.

Interpersonal: being able to face your own feelings and own inside to bring out your
creativity and personality

Naturalist: Music has always found his roots into humans emotions and feelings but also
into nature, music of the nature, river flowing, birds song…

8. a) Positive reinforces are used in teaching process to motivate students to keep

strength and active into their learning process. For example, giving good feedback as
complimenting or smiling (no verbal communication) will emphasise the ability of a
student to staying motivated for practising. Giving grade during an exam is also a way for
a children to situate himself, as a kid it could be a relief to visualise his level, and his
progression into something very practical as grades. New repertoire, emphasising the end
of the work on a piece that the kid played well and starting a new one, may be more
challenging, could also help to reinforce motivation and self esteem!

b) Negative reinforces are usually used by teachers as a way of pushing the student to
becoming active, making them realise that they need to change their behaviour. For that,
they can avoid a lesson, not giving a lesson to a student that didn’t practice is a way of
making them realise that they are not passive element in the learning process as the
teacher is spending time and energy they need to do the same in return.

c) The main problem of positive or negative reinforces is to create a dependant

relationship relating on the teacher and not on the subject, this could lead some child to
drop playing an instrument for example when the teacher is leaving. While teaching, the
main direction should emphasise the abilities of a children to play an instrument for his
pleasure, showing him, as soon as possible, that they are able to dive into that and that
we are only here to guide them to find their way.

d) Behaviours related to positive and negative reinforcement could be see as a circle,

the child will adjust his behaviour from the teacher’s feedback; hoping that he will make
his teacher happy or proud by practising, and waiting for his teacher to be mad at him for
working. That’s why those reinforcement should always be concerning the lesson, for
example, you could show to a child that you are not happy about his practising, but it’s
about the work that hasn’t be done, and at the end show him that it doesn’t affect the
relation between you two, and by doing that, you lead the child to not emotionally
connect learning music by proving himself for his teachers or parents/related.

Tanine Kian